Hughie Fury suffers injury, pulls out of Joseph Parker fight

Boxingnews24.com

By Scott Gilfoid: 22-year-old Hughie Fury (20-0, 10 KOs) has suffered a back injury and he won’t be able to fight for a world title next month against WBO heavyweight champion Joseph Parker on May 6 in Auckland, New Zealand. You’ve got to feel sorry for the 25-year-old Parker, because he’s wasted all this time with negotiating and training for the fight, only to see Fury pull out with an injury. The Parker vs. Hughie fight will be postponed until further notice.

We saw Hughie’s cousin Tyson Fury pull out of his rematch with Wladimir for an injury as well. Wladimir waited ages for a rematch with Fury that never happened. The good news that can come out of this is Parker will be going ahead and fighting a voluntary defense next. Depending on who Parker’s promoters at Duco Events select, he would very well wind up fighting someone with more talent than Hughie. That’s the thing.

Hughie hadn’t fought in 1 year since his match against Fred Kassi in April 2016, and he looked terrible in that fight. Kassi was starting to get to Hughie with big pot shots that he was bouncing off his head one after another. Hughie suffered a cut from a head-butt, and that allowed the fight to go to the scorecards in the 7th. Hughie had built up a lead previous to that.

This would have been the 6’6” Hughie’s first crack at a world title. Who knows when Hughie will be healed enough to get back inside the ring. Whether the World Boxing Organization will freeze Hughie’s #1 ranking with their organization is unclear.

“Duco Events was today notified by the World Boxing Organization that mandatory No 1 challenger Hughie Fury has an injury, and will be unable to challenge champion Joseph Parker for the Heavyweight Title on May 6 in Auckland,” Parker’s promoters at Duco Events said via skysports.com. “The World Boxing Organization has, therefore, advised Duco Events to investigate the possibility of Joseph Parker making a voluntary defence of his heavyweight title against an opponent ranked in the top 15 of the world rankings.”

Later this year, Parker could be facing the winner of this Saturday’s fight between IBF heavyweight champion Anthony Joshua and Wladimir Klitschko. That would be great for Parker if he can get the winner of that fight, because it would be a huge match in the UK. There would a lot of boxing fans interested in seeing Parker and Joshua go at it. Wladimir has a chance of beating Joshua, but I think it’s more likely that we’ll be Joshua as the winner of that fight.

I hope Hughie doesn’t stay out of the ring for too long, because if he misses too much time, it’s going to be difficult for him to restart his stalled career. Right now, Hughie has been out of the ring for 1 year. But if he still hasn’t fought by April of next year, then we’re talking 2 years of inactivity. I’m sorry, I don’t see Hughie being able to come back from that long of a layoff.

There are some boxing fans that question why the WBO gave Hughie a No.1 ranking with their organization. When you look at Hughie’s resume, he hasn’t beaten anyone that you would think was a good enough fighter for him to be rated so highly. Hughie being rated No.1 after struggling to beat journeyman Fred Kassi shouldn’t be a big enough win for him to be rated so highly. That’s the way I see it.

Beating Kassi is more like a victory that would give Hughie a bottom 15 ranking at the most, but DEFINITELY not No.1. The last time I checked, Kassi isn’t a contender in the heavyweight division. Besides that, Hughie didn’t finish the full 12 round fight with Kassi due to the cut he suffered. There was an unfinished quality to the Hughie-Kassi.

If you look at the fight, Hughie build up a lead after 4 rounds, and then he got tired and started getting nailed with big shots to the head by Kassi in rounds 5, 6 and 7. Things were looking bleak for Hughie in the 7th when out of nowhere he suffered a cut from a head clash. You can argue that the cut saved Hughie from being knocked out by Kassi. As tired as Hughie was, I don’t think he would have lasted much longer if the fight had gone into the 8th. Kassi was nailing Hughie with monstrous head shots that had the crowd screaming, and this was a pro-Hughie crowd.

Parker’s management is looking to find a replacement opponent for him as soon as possible. Parker wants to stay active, and he can’t afford to sit on the sidelines for too long.

David Haye and Tony Bellew to work on the Sky Box Sports Box Office team for Anthony Joshua vs. Wladimir Klitschko fight on Saturday

David Haye and Tony Bellew could cross paths this Saturday with them working on the Sky Sports Box Office team for the Anthony Joshua vs. Wadimir Klitschko fight at Wembey Stadium in London, England. Haye lost to Bellew by an 11th round knockout on March 4 last month. Haye injured his right Achilles in the 6th and Bellew was able to take over the fight and get the victory.

Haye didn’t seem angry with Bellew after the fight, so I don’t see why there would be any problems with the two fighters being around each other this Saturday. Haye has made it clear that he wants a rematch with Bellew.

It’s up to Bellew to decide if he wants to fight him again. You could understand why Bellew might not want to take the risk of giving Haye a second fight. If Haye is healthy, he likely beats the brakes off Bellew, especially if he’s well-trained for the fight. If Bellew loses badly to Haye, then that would show the boxing world that the only reason why he beat him last time was because of his leg injury.

“If he approaches me and that’s the way he wants to go, then so be it,” said Bellew to skysports.com. “I don’t think I will be allowed too close to him, to be honest, we’ll see.”

It’ll be good to see how the two fighters react to seeing each other for the first time since their fight last month. I just hope that Haye doesn’t start talking rematch with Bellew on the spot, but this is supposed to be Joshua and Wladimir’s time. You’d hate to see Bellew and Haye make their own noise that would distract potentially from the event.

It’s obvious to me that the only reason Bellew beat Haye was because of his leg injury. Before the injury, Haye was beating Bellew with his jab alone. Haye was nailing Bellew repeatedly with his jab. The only thing that Bellew could do well was stay out of range of Haye’s power shots. Bellew would scat each time Haye attempted to hit him with one of his big punches. It was a pure defensive fight for Bellew until Haye hurt his leg. After the injury, Bellew started his own offense and was able to eventually get the stoppage.

If there’s any concern with Haye and Bellew getting into it this Saturday, then the Sky people can make sure they’re assigned to different areas of the event. It’s easy enough for them to do. They could have Haye in the booth and Bellew at ringside. It shouldn’t be a big deal.